The 3rd Vienna Music Business Research Days were devoted to the “New Music Consumption Behaviour”. Therefore, recent music consumer surveys for the U.K. and for Austria were presented and the hypothesis of music prosumption was highlighted. In another contribution the impact of music file sharing on the quality of new music products was measured. Further the French authority for protection of copyrights on the Internet – HADOPI – was presented and the effects of its operations on P2P file sharing were highlighted. In the following panel discussion “Three Strikes and Out” music industry and copyright expertes controversially debated the concept of graduaded response scheme (aka “three strikes” models) such as HADOPI in France. In this context the question “Are File Sharers Pirates?” was already controversially discussed by a sentenced file sharer and the author of the the book “Free Ride. How Digital Parasites Are Destroying the Culture Business”.

The 3rd Vienna Music Business Research Days were opened by the Young Scholars’ Workshop on June 29. Nineteen young academics from seven countries presented their research papers, which represented the full range of music business research. The best Young Scholars’ paper was then awarded by and international jury at the end of the conference on June 30.

In the following the 3rd Vienna Music Business Research on “New Music Consumption Behaviour” is summarised and all presentations and discussions can be audio streamed. Most of the papers and power point presentation are also available as downloads.

On June 29, 2012 the 3rd Vienna Music Business Research Days at the University of Music and Performing Arts Vienna will be opened with the Young Scholars’ Workshop at 9.00 am. Nineteen young academics from seven different countries will present current research results on different aspects of the music economy. The programme and most of the papers can found on the conference’s wepage.

The Saturday morning is devoted to the presentation of recent studies on the music consumption behavior in Austria (by Michael Huber, University of Music and Performing Arts Vienna) and in the U.K. (by David Bahanovich and Dennis Collopy, University of Hertfordshire). In addition Carsten Winter (University of Music, Drama and Media Hanover) will talk about “Prosumers and Their New On-Demand-Music Culture”.

After the lunch break, Joel Waldfogel (University of Minnesota, U.S.) will highlight in his speech the relation of “Copyright Protection, Technological Change and the Quality of New Products”. This will lead us to a presentation by Rose-Marie Hunault of the French authority HADOPI, which screens internet connections in France to prevent the exchange of copyrighted material without prior agreement from the copyright holders. In the following panel discussion “Three Strikes and Out!”, Mrs. Hunault will discuss the efficiency and other aspects of the graduated response measures with music industry and IPR experts – Peter Jenner (music manager and WIPO consultant, U.K.), Martin Kretschmer, (Bournemouth University, U.K.) and Harald Hanisch (music producer and Austrian Composers’ Society) – under the guidance of heise online journalist Stefan Krempl.
The conference will be closed with the award for the best paper of the Young Scholars’ Workshop at 18.00.

One might wonder if there is a need for an academic journal on the music business. Several high-profile trade publications on the music business are published regularly and in the torrent of academic journals one can find titles that focus on popular music, the creative industries, cultural economics and arts management. Nevertheless, there is a gap for a publication wholly dedicated to the academic research of music business and industry topics. The International Journal of Music Business Research (IJMBR) tries to fill this gap by providing a new platform for publication of articles on the phenomena of the music economy from different scientific perspectives.

The first issue of the IJMBR reflects a wide range of music business research topics that fit within the scope of the journal’s remit. In a theoretical piece, Patrik Wikström argues that the economic value created from recorded music is increasingly based on context rather than on ownership and that the focus of music distribution should shift from download and streaming to contextual models of music experience. The second paper is contributed by Pinie Wang, who highlights, in a historical analysis, the complex inter-relationship between the US media, advertising and music industries. Martin Kretschmer then addresses his contribution to the recent EU-copyright term extension for sound recordings, proposing that copyright interests should be transferable only for an initial term of 10 years, after which they will revert to the creator. This should lead to a remarkable decrease in orphaned work and should foster creativity and innovation.